Member in Focus
Celeste Edmunds, Age 34

In my biological family I am the oldest of three children. I have a sister two years younger and a brother six years younger. My early memories prior to age eight consist of fixing my younger sister breakfast, sending her off to kindergarten, and helping her with her homework. We moved around a lot from hotels to apartments to drug rehabilitation centers. Often my dad would make a stop in at home while running from the law to mentally abuse my mother and yell at her for what she wasn't doing right. Us three siblings also spent time living with other family members and living in foster care homes while our parents were in and out of 'recovery'. By the time I was 16 I'd lived in 31 cities.

At age seven I was sent to meet my mom, sister, and brother in Detroit, Michigan. She had already been transferred to a drug rehabilitation center there. This is when my sister and I learned how mean other youth can be when they have not been taught a better way and put in an environment to make up their own rules and survive. I grew up way too fast and began my road to adulthood at a very young age. I began protecting my sister in any way I could, both physically and sexually, and soon learned to manipulate situations to my advantage.

My biological mother and I had more than a rough relationship. It was a constant battle of who was in charge. I felt angry when she decided to occasionally be sober and take on the responsible role of parenthood. I felt that I had been obviously doing a great job for almost eight years. So it seemed to be no surprise when she told me that her and I were going to live in another drug rehabilitation center in New York City to 'work out our problems.'

My two younger siblings were sent off on a plane back to Salt Lake City and my mom and I continued to live in New York City for a couple of months. This is when my mom explained to me that my brother and sister had been sent to Salt Lake City and adopted together by a family and that I was going to be sent to Salt Lake City to live with my dad while awaiting adoption myself. I begged to her to let me stay. That I would be a better daughter and try harder as any small child would do but the decision had already been made and my mother was much too weak emotionally to handle such added stress.

Once arriving in Salt Lake City I was met by a case worker and my dad who quickly told me that I was being taken directly to another foster family and we would be allowed to spend the next Saturday together for one last time.

My dad picked me up that Saturday as early as possible and we took the entire day celebrating my last birthday, Christmas, a baseball game and many other activities together. Late that evening, we went to a movie and on the way back to the drug rehabilitation center he lived in at the time, he carried me the entire way, polio in one leg, giving me the gift that would carry me through the rest of my 'bad luck experiences' in a flawed system. The gift, was to be told that everything that was happening was not my fault and why, and to make sure that my brother and sister understood that as well. I wish all foster children could hear that from their biological parent.

I lived with a foster family for about six months when I visited another family who lived on a farm in Salt Lake City. It was obvious from the start that the mother disliked me but wanted her daughter to get what she asked for. A sister for Christmas. Although I wasn't the chosen one from the picture book where you pick older children who need to be adopted from - Buffy was her name, I would do because they had waited long enough and could not have any more children of their own.

I knew that this placement was not meant to be. I waited for the caseworkers to come back and save me but no one ever came like they said they would. No one ever asked how things were. The next thing I knew I was standing in front of a judge in his chambers being told how "lucky" I was to be adopted as an older child - that it is a rare thing to have this happen. They even set up my younger brother and sister's adoption to their family to happen on the same day thinking that this would be a "special" occasion for us to be adopted on the same day. Interesting that anyone thought we would feel special to be adopted officially into separate families.

The next seven years of my life were hell to say the least. Disney's Cinderella couldn't begin to describe the experience of hate, rage, jealousy, fear, and abandonment that my adopted mom gave to me. From mind games to manipulation to physical and mostly emotional abuse the woman hated me with everything in her.

At age fifteen I decided to make a life for myself and ran away. I was not sure where I would end up or with whom, but I knew I would never be with them again. I bounced around from home to home, dropped out of high school, moved out of state for a while and began a life leading to nowhere fast. Until one day I returned to Salt Lake City to visit a friend.

I came just a few days before Thanksgiving and never left. The single mom and two daughters that I moved in with showed me more than love, they taught me that there are people who are willing to stay in your life no matter the cost and that love leaves no regrets. Unconditional love. Each year, Thanksgiving became another year. Kind of an anniversary and on our ninth anniversary, I made a toast to the entire family thanking them for letting me be in their lives and shared that this was the longest I'd ever been in one family. My mom (as I am proud to say) suggested that we legalize the bond between us all. At twenty-six years old, I was re-adopted as an adult into this amazing family, proving that it is never too late to find a home.

Right now I am a proud mom of three: Eric age 13, Alex age 10 and Mykaella age 3, who bring me more hope and strength than I ever imagined possible. They are gifts from God as a reminder that the life I led was worth it all to get where I am now. I helped to found a national children's charity, The Christmas Box International, which is a shelter, assessment and advocacy center for children removed from their homes as a result of abuse and neglect and served as their as the National Director of Advocacy for ten years. I was honored to serve for three years in the nations oldest child welfare organization - The Child Welfare League of America. I advocate and raise money and awareness for children's programs and will continue the legislative battle of bringing more attention and positive change of direction for children in the foster care system.